Here and Now
by SpellCleaver
Summary: Galan Ashryver was just mounting his steed to ride to face the soldiers when the messenger returned from Mistward. He hadn't expected it, and he read it in haste. But that didn't mean that the single sentence scrawled across it was any less powerful. 'If you do not send help to Mistward within the next few hours you doom Aelin Ashryver Galathynius to die.' Set in HoF. AU


**I've always liked imagining the first meeting between Aelin and Galan, because it's an interesting point, and I had to put some thought into how she would react. So I got this idea, and just ran with it. It's set around the time just after Aelin defeated the Valg in Heir of Fire. What would have happened if Wendlyn had sent help.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Throne of Glass.**

* * *

Galan Ashryver was just mounting his steed to ride to face the Adarlanian soldiers when the messenger returned from the demi-Fae fortress. He hadn't expected it, and he read it in haste. But that didn't mean that the single sentence scrawled across it was any less powerful.

 _'If you do not send help to Mistward within the next few hours you doom Aelin Ashryver Galathynius to die.'_

* * *

Everything was either made of fire, or darkness.

Celaena - no; she was Aelin now - twisted her head from side to side, trying to see past the darkness, past the raging fire, with the sinking feeling that this wasn't any fire; this was _her_ fire. That the screams she heard, the shouts that were shattering her eardrums and her heart, were borne of her wildfire. She was the uncontrollable inferno; she was the force of destruction that had wreaked havoc on this continent.

But then she heard the voice. "Get up, Aelin."

Aelin - for she was Aelin, she had decided - twisted towards the voice, and saw that child, that unscarred, innocent child looking at her. She stood amongst the wildfire without it touching her, and she was not afraid.

 _I will not be afraid._

"Get up, Aelin," she said again, holding out her hands. Aelin went to take it, and had only just realised that her voice was remarkably deep for a young child's, when she opened her eyes, and welcomed the sight of that tattooed, silver-haired Fae male standing over her.

"Get up," he said again, and using his grip on her hand to drag her from the bed, and to dispel any last remnants of sleep. "Get dressed, quickly. You have company waiting for you downstairs."

With her brain fully functioning, her heart sank like one of those obsidian rings had when they'd thrown it in the sea the evening before. She could guess who it was. "How long was I asleep?" She asked, realising that whilst she didn't feel quite on the top of her game, she was surprised to feel sparks ready to jump to her fingertips if she willed it. She'd been so certain she was close to a burnout. It had to have been-

"Three days," Rowan said bluntly, voice as harsh as ever. "You went into the sleep magic wielders go into when they need to replenish their energy. A sleep where no one and nobody can stir them." The side of his mouth quirked up, and Aelin marvelled at the change in him, that change that had been brought about by something so simple as a few words.

 _I claim you too, Aelin Galathynius._

Nevertheless, she winced as she got up, the aches and pains in her body blatantly protesting the movement. She would have thought three days would be enough time for most bruises to fade, but apparently not. She glanced down at the scarred inside of her palm. The scar from the cut she'd made to mingle her blood with Rowan's crisscrossed the scar of the promise she'd made to Nehemia. It was oddly soothing, seeing the marks of two friendships overlapping each other, even if it could viewed as a bad omen, considering the end of Nehemia.

She took a deep, soothing breath, and shot Rowan a glare that he interpreted - correctly - as a request for him to get out of the room. He laughed again but obliged.

She shivered as she rolled out from amongst the sheets, and hastily stripped off the loose dress and underwear she'd been put in - undoubtably by Rowan, or whoever had carried her up to her room in the keep. She snorted with laughter at the thought of how scandalised Rowan would be if he had to be the one to undress and dress her. His horror was be something unparalleled by any she'd seen before.

Finally, she'd thrown on a simple brown tunic and trousers, identical to what she'd been wearing for the past few months. Identical to what everyone else in Mistward was wearing. Because the Gods knew she was far too recognisable as it was.

She went to throw her hair back in a plait, but when she clumped it together with her hand they fell through her fingers. She huffed, then remembered the feel of the Valg's claw slicing through her plait, the feel of her now short hair falling about her chin, of the claw against the pale, unprotected skin of her throat. . .

She'd dropped the hairbrush and hurried outside, slamming the door behind her like she was trying to flee from her own train of thought.

Luca walked down the corridor with a Wendlyn soldier in tow. They seemed to be deep in conversation, but Luca caught her eye and gave her a grave nod, which she swiftly returned. She knew how much the betrayal of Bas and the other traitor demi-Fae had hit Luca. The Wendlyn soldier glanced up, and his brown eyes widened when he saw her face, and her eyes, but she'd brushed past him and down the corridor before he had the chance to comment on it.

Gods, she hated how recognisable her face was. Especially with her cousin in the same building as her.

The thought nearly brought her up short. Galan Ashryver, the son of the man who'd abandoned his sister, her mother, when she'd needed it the most, was in the same building as her. Her cousin.

She'd never used the word cousin to describe anyone but Aedion; never needed or wanted to. She knew it had been one of his proudest titles. So why did it feel like such a betrayal to use it on Galan now, even ten years after she last spoke to her real - or, as real as it could be - cousin?

When she stopped before the kitchen door, she realised with a jolt that she'd taken the long way round. She'd subconsciously taken the way round that would ensure she didn't bump into anyone.

She applauded her subconscious for that.

But now it was time to go in.

So she steeled her nerves, and opened the door.

* * *

Galan Ashryver sat at the table in the kitchen of Mistward, and tapped the dagger strapped to his thigh with a nervous frenzy.

The old man who seemed to be in charge of the place gave him a sidelong glance. "You might want to stop that, Your Highness. The noise is especially horrible to Fae ears."

Galan swallowed. He knew, all too well, how mistrustful demi-Fae were of humans, and he honestly couldn't blame them. He himself, like his cousins Aedion and Aelin, and the rest of the Ashryvers, was descended from Mab, the sister to the current Fae queen of this continent, Maeve, but that Fae heritage was diluted, and he often had to cater to the wishes of his mortal people, who were deeply suspicious of demi-Fae, rather than the ones who had been born somewhere in between Varese and Doranelle. So it would make sense that the residents of Mistward - rejected by both peoples - would be as suspicious of him as they were of Maeve, even if his aunt Evalin _had_ worked with them for several years.

That didn't mean he had to like it.

He hadn't wanted to send the order to leave Mistward to face Adarlan's creations on its own, but he'd had little choice. Adarlan had launched an attack fleet three thousand strong on the northern borders, and there was no way he was going to let that go unchecked. He had a reputation as a blockade runner against Adarlan for a reason.

That didn't stop the guilt from drying up his throat, and causing his eyes to flick to the ceiling, where he knew his cousin was probably still sleeping from the exhaustion the near-burnout had inflicted on her.

He hadn't planned on coming at all, but when he received the letter, he'd been compelled to get the raid over and done with as soon as possible, so he could see for himself if the letter had been telling the truth. So they'd pushed themselves, and had it done with within a few hours, then rode like Hellas was chasing them to get to Mistward. When they'd got there, Galan had been surprised to find the five trained Fae males fighting alongside the untrained demi-Fae, and to see that the tide of the battle was turning in their favour. He'd breathlessly asked where Aelin was, and the one who he'd seen transforming into a lion and back - Gavriel, if the legends were to be believed - had said that she was facing the Adarlanian creatures out the front of the fortress with Rowan, the last member of their cadre.

She had been the source of the fire they'd seen blooming against the darkness as they rode in.

Galan had rushed out, sword at the ready in one hand, his droplets of inherited healing power in the other, only to see the darkness and fire disappear altogether, with no strange creatures to be found. He had heard two distinct _thunks_ as what looked like collars of black stone tumbled to the ground, and Aelin. . . Aelin fell with them, her bright hair fluttering as she toppled into the grass in a dead faint. The silver-haired Fae male next to her scooped her up and carried her inside the gates, gently setting her down to lean against the inside of one of the ward stones, still humming with the power she'd undoubtably given them.

Rowan had stalked up to him with that unnerving feline grace all full-blooded Fae possessed, and practically growled at him. "The battle is won." Of course, Galan had realised; he could probably hear far more than him thanks to his Fae hearing. "If you want to wait for her to wake up, you'll be waiting for a while."

Then he'd brushed past him to go inside, leaving Aelin out on her own, unconscious. Galan had cast another look back at her, then followed.

"Please," the old man said now, "stop. It's horrendous."

Galan hadn't realised he'd begun tapping again. He mumbled an apology, and fidgeted under the old man's scrutinising gaze.

"You seem nervous," the old man said. It occurred to Galan that it was probably rude that he didn't know his name when he'd probably been told, but he couldn't help it; he'd forgotten it amongst the stress of the moment. When Galan didn't answer his unspoken question, the old man went on, "She's just a person. She's not completely beyond empathy. It probably won't be a nightmare talking to her."

Galan raised an eyebrow. "Probably?"

The old man shrugged, then turned back to the stove. "It's hard to tell with her. She's a bit. . . volatile."

 _Not. Helping._ He wanted to say, but understanding that the old man was probably right, and had faced enough in the past few days, he kept his mouth shut.

"Did you know," the old man went on, not turning round to look at him. His voice had taken on a different tone, one similar to the tone the Story Keeper back at the palace always used when recalling legends. He was a Story Keeper in himself, the old man, Galan realised with a jolt. That would explain why he was so well respected here. "That Evalin Ashryver was my friend?"

Any words he could have said dried up in his throat at the mention of his long dead - long abandoned - aunt.

The old man didn't seem affected by his silence, and went on without waiting for an answer. "She came here, years ago now, to work with us. She wanted to show her people, the people of Wendlyn - _your_ people - that we demi-Fae aren't bad, not in the way they make us out to be. She had a vision of a united world, and we all worked to help her make it come true.

"And then she left," the old man continued, a little pensively. "She told me that Rhoe Galathynius, the Crown Prince of Terrasen, that distant country across the sea, had come to visit as an ambassador for his uncle, and that they'd fallen in love with each other. As proof of his devotion, Rhoe had given her the Amulet of Orynth, a powerful heirloom of his people, to wear, so that she would stay safe between the moment he left to report back to his uncle, and the moment he returned to take her as his bride. She never took it off, and wore it around the Keep.

"The day she left for Terrasen was a sad day for all of us. We were invited to her wedding, where it was held in Varese, but we all declined, since even seeing her on her wedding day wasn't worth being shunned by the rest of the city. So she came to Mistward, said goodbye, and promised to write.

"We were among the first people to know when she found out she was pregnant. True to her word, she'd kept in touch with all of us, and so we were well aware of the troubles she had conceiving, due to her Fae blood. So when she found out, both she and Rhoe were overjoyed, and she wrote letters to us and her family - specifically her twin sister, who'd already had her Aedion - about it. We all wrote back, and wished her well.

"When Aelin was born, Maeve started to become interested in the welfare of her young niece. She even went so far as to come here, to Mistward, and asked to see the letters Evalin had sent about Aelin. We tried to refuse, and when the time came to write back to her, we told her that she had to stop writing so regularly, and in such great detail about her daughter, if she valued the safety of her family.

"So the letters grew fewer and further between. We heard that Evalin had promised to take Aelin to visit Maeve once she was born, so we anticipated a meeting in person, for she'd be undoubtably staying at Mistward, but she never came. And we all viewed that as a good thing; better that Maeve never got the chance to get her claws into Brannon's heir.

"But then Terrasen was attacked by Adarlan, and the royal family assassinated," the old man continued, and Galan flinched at what was surely coming next. "And because Evalin broke her promise, and never brought Aelin to see Maeve, Maeve refused to come to Terrasen's aid, and commanded your father did the same. And so Aelin was condemned to live the life she's lived." The old man's eyes drifted over Galan's arms, at the battle scars he'd collected and coveted. "She has more scars than even you, Prince."

 _So, a lot then._ Galan swallowed again, and shivered. The old man noticed, and walked away from the stove to kneel before the fireplace, where he knelt and started striking flint against flint to light it.

The door opened and closed, quietly, and then the fire blossomed like someone had commanded it to. The old man got up, and turned to look at the newcomer. His eyes flicked between them and Galan, unreadable, before focusing on the person behind him. "Thank you, Elentiya."

"You're welcome, Emrys," came the reply, and finally Galan turned to look at them.

And his breath caught in his throat.

His cousin, Aelin Galathynius, stood in the doorway. Her hair fell to around about her jaw, and her eyes, identical to his own, were solemn, but something sparked in them, like a warning that she was dangerous, and it would take little encouragement for her to light the world up again. She was fairly tall, about the same height as him, but there was something in her face that was much harder and just overall more severe than any of his other family members.

She walked in with a steady confidence that seemed born of a lack or care of what people thought of her, and wordlessly stood by the sink, and cast a questioning glance at the old man - Emrys. He nodded at the stack of dishes, and said, "Get to work on those, Elentiya, and Galan can help you." He didn't think that arguing would exactly go down well with either of them, even if he was a Crown Prince. So he nodded.

Aelin just nodded wordlessly as well, but eyed him with an assessing gaze as he went to stand next to her. "You take the cloth. I'll wash; you dry." She ordered, with a tone that did not expect to be questioned.

So he did so without question.

* * *

 _Shit._

 _Shit shit shit._

Aelin just stood there, mechanically scrubbing at the dishes and silently handing them to Galan, who took them just as silently and dried them, then set them aside. She could feel the space between them writhe like it was charged with some sort of magic, and she surreptitiously swallowed, glad that the water gave her an excuse to dry her hands. This was her _cousin_ she was standing next to, and all she could do was wash dishes?

She could almost hear Dorian's laughter from here.

She swallowed again, and Galan spoke. "So. . ." He trailed off. "Um. . . hello?"

She nodded in reply, painfully aware of how awkward this was. "Hello." She choked out, then said, "Cousin," just to see how the word felt on her lips after ten years of not saying it.

Why couldn't Rowan have let her sleep any longer?

He only nodded, though his face looked a little less grave. "Cousin," he affirmed.

Oh gods, that _face_. He and she didn't look alike as she and Aedion had, like two sides of the same coin, but more like two renderings of one face: one in moonlight, one in firelight. They had the same golden skin, and identical eyes, but whilst her hair was a mane of gold, his was the colour of chestnuts, and his eyebrows were like two dashes of mud on his face.

Galan Ashryver.

Her cousin.

 _Gods_ that felt strange to say.

"Elentiya?" Emrys asked, and she could have kissed him for using that name, even though she knew he knew who she was. Did he know how much that name meant to her, what with it being Nehemia to give it to her? Did he understand it's meaning, and realise how it was nothing but a comfort after the events of the past few days?

Or did he just understand that she really didn't need reminding of who she was right now?

"I'll be heading upstairs," he said, but his eyes gleamed with something like pride when he looked at Galan and Aelin standing there. "When you want to eat, just help yourselves," he said, gesturing towards the food laid out on the table. "Have fun." _Try not to kill him,_ his eyes reproached, and she very pointedly turned away.

"So. . ." Galan said, as they fell back into their little routine. "How did you survive all of these years?"

She pursed her lips, but when she spoke, her voice was soft. Reverent. "When the assassin came, Lady Marion sacrificed herself so I could escape." A week ago she would have cried, or screamed, or broken something if she tried to talk about it. But now, she spoke the words with the awe and respect they deserved.

She was different now. She had walked through the darkness and come out changed; she had learned that hers was not a tale of it.

So Aelin's voice remained steady as she spoke. She told her story as it was: of fire, and hope, and heartbreak. She told him about growing up in the Assassin's Keep, and even paused in her work to show him the scar that she'd received when Arobynn had told her to break her own hand. She told him about Sam, and the Pirate Lord, and the Silent Assassins, even if she missed out the story of the backstabbing friend she'd made there. She told him about Endovier, though refused to admit to the whip scars, and then the competition to become the King's Champion, and then that piece of shit Archer Finn, even if she kept the exact nature of her relationships with Chaol and Dorian to herself, and about how she spared all of her victims. She told him about how the King of Adarlan had sent her here to kill Galan and his father, and how Rowan had found her in Varese, and then every inch of the gruelling training from there. finally, she told him about the skin-walkers, and the villagers they'd talked to, and the final battle with the Valg, and the dishes they had to wash ran out, and they went to sit at the table.

She omitted any knowledge about the Wyrdkeys and what she was asking of Maeve; she couldn't trust him enough to tell him that within minutes of meeting him.

But he was a good listener, and didn't look at her with hatred even when she recounted the worse times of her life, and when she finally stopped talking to dig into a large breakfast (Who knew talking could be so tiring?) he just sat there pensively.

Eventually, he said, "What you're asking of Maeve. . . It has something to do with defeating the King of Adarlan, doesn't it?"

She nodded, not able to stop eating long enough to word a response. "Mm hm."

He smiled slightly as she said that, but he was perfectly solemn when he stated, "Let me help you."

She froze, looked up, and raised an eyebrow. He kept talking.

"I'm a blockade runner against Adarlan. You know this; you said the King sent you here to kill me because of it. I have an army at my command. We can take Terrasen back, and free Eyllwe, and all those other countries you mentioned." He leaned forward and gripped her hands. "And Aedion. Your mother said in her letters that Aedion used to be your greatest protector. And he commands the Bane."

"He probably hates me."

"We'll have to take that risk, Aelin." He said, and his eyes - her eyes - were alight with something akin to hope. It was that spark of determination Nehemia had always had, that look that made you glance at someone and instantly know that they were on the way to changing the world.

It lifted her spirits a little.

Galan was pacing now, voicing his thoughts aloud. "And if we can get the Bane on our side, then that'll swell the numbers by a significant amount. And then, by the sounds of it, you've got quite a number of life debts to call in, from the Silent Assassins for one thing."

And Ansel of Briarcliff, that red-haired queen who ruled in the crumbling castle.

"We could do it, Aelin." He realised. "If we join forces we could destroy the King of Adarlan for good. And then if Dorian Havilliard is as good as you say he is, we would manage to maintain peaceful relations with the country."

Aelin felt something flutter beneath her ribcage, something she had not felt in a long time.

Hope.

She had made up her mind to save her country, and to claim her crown. And with her cousin, she could do it.

"First things first," she said. "I need to go to Doranelle, and get the information out of Maeve. Then I'll meet you in Varese, and we can plan from there."

"Are you going to tell me what you're actually asking of our aunt?" Galan asked curiously, pausing in his pacing to study her reaction.

She said carefully, "After I've talked to her about it." She breathed a sigh of relief as his face melted into understanding.

Galan nodded in acquiescence. "Well then, Aelin Ashryver Galathynius," he said, and he grinned at her.

She had to overwhelming urge to grin back.

So she did.

"Ready to change the world?"

* * *

 **I have no idea whether this will be a oneshot or a short story or proper one or whatever, as I said earlier: I just got the idea and ran with it.**

 **What did you think? Review?**


End file.
